Tropical Storm Nicole weakened slightly as it moved southward, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said on Friday.

Nicole, downgraded from a hurricane earlier in the day, was about 550 miles (880 km) north of San Juan, Puerto Rico, with maximum sustained winds of 60 miles per hour (95 kph), the center said in an advisory.

(Reporting by Brendan O'Brien in Milwaukee; Editing by Paul Tait)

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TOKYO Japan's government on Friday nearly doubled its projections for costs related to the Fukushima nuclear disaster to 21.5 trillion yen ($188 billion), increasing pressure on Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco) to step up reform and improve its performance.

Twenty-three rescued African penguins that had been abandoned several weeks ago along the coast of South Africa were released back into the wild on Thursday, according to officials at the U.S. aquarium who helped rehabilitate them.

Washington state filed an environmental lawsuit on Thursday against agricultural company Monsanto Co seeking damages and cleanup costs associated with the company's production of PCBs, the state's attorney general said.